June 27, 2025 • 35 mins
Hour 3 of A&G features... Tim Sandefur!
- Principles of The Declaration
- Explaining The Declaration of Independence
- Writing The Declaration
- Underrated Founding Fathers!
Stupid Should Hurt: https://www.armstrongandgetty.com/
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio the George
Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Armstrong and Jettie and He Armstrong and Yetty.
Speaker 3 (00:24):
Goodness sakes, what a day. The crew has taken the
week off next week to enjoy Independence Day in a
little summer fun, family time.
Speaker 1 (00:34):
Travel, etc.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
Today is the last show obviously, before that Jack is
winging his way toward Florida with his boys, and I
decided I would love to talk to Tim Sander for
the Vice President for Legal Affairs at the Goldwater Institute
about the Declaration of Independence. Independence Day and one of
my favorite books. Tim wrote, The Conscience of the Constitution,
(00:58):
the Declaration of Independent and it's in the right to
liberty and by coincidence, today is also the day that
the Supreme Court is handing out rulings right and left.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Tim Sander for joys Is, Tim, how are you.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
I'm just great. Thanks for having me back.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
Oh, it's always a pleasure.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
Have you gotten a chance to take in some of
the Scotis' recent issuances.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
I had to skim some of them, and.
Speaker 4 (01:22):
This universal injunction decision is really unfortunate. It's a bad ruling,
and honestly, it's a really stupid ruling because here's the
thing so universal injunctions. That's when a plaintiff goes to
court and says the government is doing something unconstitutional, and
the judge says, that's right, the government must stop doing
(01:43):
this unconstitutional thing. That's a universal injunction. What the opponents
of universal injunctions complain about is they say, well, why
should a judge in California be able to bar the
federal government from doing something in Florida. And the answer
to that is because it's unconstitutional. What the ruling today
says is now the California federal judge can only issue
(02:05):
a ruling barring the unconstitutional thing from happening to the
particular people in that particular lawsuit. Well, of course, that's
how injunctions work anyway. So all that this ruling says
today is that the judge has to write in his opinion,
I'm only saying this applies to the plaintiffs in this lawsuit. Well,
of course, everybody knows that's already the rule. It's just
(02:25):
that the federal government has to follow the law. So
if it's doing something in Florida, that's unconstitutional in California.
It's still unconstitutional wherever it's happening, so it's illegal. So
it's really just creating this weird new formality in how
courts go about enforcing the Constitution and justice. Jackson, in
her dissenting opinion, has it exactly right. She says, now
(02:45):
a court's power to prevent constitutional violations comes with an asterisk.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
A court can make.
Speaker 4 (02:51):
The executive cease its unconstitutional conduct asterisk, but only with
respect to the particular plaintiffs named in the lawsuit before them,
being the government free to violate the constitutional rights of
anyone and everyone else.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
It's a terrible thing, and it's just anyway. It's frustrating
by it.
Speaker 4 (03:09):
No, because there's been a lot of talk among the
conservative legal community about trying to stop nationwide injunctions because
a lot of conservative lawyers and judges are scared of
what they call activist judges. I am not scared of
activist judges. I'm scared of judges getting things wrong, whether
it be conservative or liberal judges getting things wrong. But activists,
(03:30):
there's no It's much worse to have a passive judge
who does nothing right. That's much worse when the government
does something unconstitutional and you go to a judge that
get them to stop, and the judge says, oh, I'm
not I'm just gonna let them do whatever.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
I'm not going to be active. That's terrible.
Speaker 4 (03:46):
That's Kilo versus New London, right where the government comes
along and steals your house to hand over to Kyo
or something, and the court stands back and refuses to
host the constitution.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
That's a passive judge. That's not what we want.
Speaker 4 (03:58):
We want judges to be active in enforcing the constitution.
We don't want them to be wrong, of course, but
we don't want the Congress or the president to.
Speaker 2 (04:05):
Be wrong either.
Speaker 4 (04:06):
So the idea that what we want is a passive,
non activist judiciary is just crazy.
Speaker 1 (04:12):
Right.
Speaker 3 (04:12):
So, people who object to the high number of these
injunctions and how they've interfered with federal policy, that's in quotes.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
I mean, you can agree with that or not.
Speaker 3 (04:22):
The answer is that's why we have the appeals process,
and it'll be fine, just give it a little time.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
Yep, exactly.
Speaker 4 (04:28):
And the reason why we have so many of these
injunctions going on right now is because the president is
doing so many unconstitutional things.
Speaker 3 (04:34):
That's why, Oh, look at you say. If you expected pandering,
you're not going to get it here. So the specific
reason I invited Tim to be on the show today
is we're leading up to Independence Day July fourth, and
I know how much you like to talk about the
Declaration of Independence liberty in general, and one of my
(04:56):
favorite books of years, as I mentioned, was The Conscience
of the Constitution, which, to my horror, came out like
eleven years ago. I know, why did you write the book?
What argument are you making?
Speaker 4 (05:09):
Well, So for I'll preface this by saying, if you
like this book, you'll be excited to know I've got
a new book about the Declaration of Independence that's schedule
to come out next year, in time for the universtieth anniversary.
I just finished what I hope is the final draft
of it, and I hope people will read and enjoy
it about the history of the declaration and what exactly
are all of the grievances talking about, and what exactly
(05:32):
Britain was doing, because it really bothers me that people say, oh,
it's just a fight over a text on tea, and
they ignore that British colonial rule really was oppressive and tyrannical.
Speaker 2 (05:42):
But that aside.
Speaker 4 (05:44):
The reason I wrote Conscience of the Constitution is to
argue that the Declaration of Independence isn't just a piece
of political rhetoric. It's law. It's the law of the land.
It is as much the law as the Federal Constitution
itself is law. And we tend to kind of shrug
that aside for a couple of reasons. In fact, worse
(06:04):
than that, when Barrett was at her confirmation hearing, she
was directly asked, is the Declaration of Independence law? And
she answered no, Well, she would have flunked MI con
law class for some of that. The Declaration of Independence
is a statute. It was passed by the Continental Congress.
It's in the Statute Books, Volume one, page one of
(06:25):
the United States Code, Declaration of Independence.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
And for good reason.
Speaker 4 (06:29):
It sets forth the principles that make our government justify
that make it a legitimate government instead of just an
arbitrary rule. And those principles are equality of rights, individual liberty,
limited government, the people rule, and so forth.
Speaker 3 (06:46):
How do you suppose somebody is learned and intelligent as
justice Barrett would come to that conclusion.
Speaker 4 (06:53):
Well, so I mentioned earlier that a lot of our
conservative friends are so scared about judicial activism, and so
they think the way to fight back against judicial activism
is to say that judges are never supposed to draw
any kind.
Speaker 2 (07:06):
Of moral or normative distinctions.
Speaker 4 (07:10):
That judges are supposed to be just as Chief Tess
Robert said, we're just umpires calling balls and strikes. And
that theory is that the Constitution has no moral direction
to it, that it's just sort of this value neutral
framework for democracy, and that's not correct. The Declaration of
Independence tells us that the Constitution has a moral direction
(07:33):
to it, and that is that individual freedom is the
primary political value, not democracy. And today we're so propagandized
to to believe that democracy is the most important thing
about our system that we forget that, in fact, the
word democracy doesn't even appear in the Constitution of the
United States. On the contrary, the reason we have a
(07:55):
constitution is to limit democracy, to prioritize individual rights over
majority rule.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
But because that seems to lead to judicial activism, a
lot of our.
Speaker 4 (08:07):
Conservative lawyers and judges don't like the Declaration of Independence,
particularly Justice Scalia. Justice Scalia had this sort of fight
with Thomas over this issue.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Thomas is a pro Declaration.
Speaker 4 (08:19):
Of Independence justice and Scalia was anti Declaration of Independence.
And the reason why was because Scalia thought it led
to judicial activism. And Justice Thomas believes, at least to
some degree, in natural rights, that there really are individual
rights and government must respect those in all cases. And
so there's a very interesting opinion. They were called Troxel
versus Granville, where Scalia agreed with Thomas except for two sentences,
(08:45):
and he specifically said he did not agree with those
two sentences, and those are the two sentences where Justice
Thomas quotes the Declaration of Independence. So it's really this
is not just a bunch of abstract theorizing. This relates
to how the government actually operates in daily, day to
day work. Whether you believe, really believe in the principles
of the declaration, or whether you just recite them without
thinking what they mean.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
Right, And I certainly count myself among those who believe
in the principles fervently. I don't know exactly how to
ask this question, but on a practical level, you said,
you know, the Declaration is a law. The first Really,
on a practical level, as I look at the truths
(09:27):
that we hold to be self evident that all men
are created equal, that they aren't doubted by their creator,
with certain unalienable rights, among these life, liberty, and the
pursuit of happiness. Do I then look at everything that
happened after that through the lens of that declaration and
assess whether it holds true.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
To those principles or not.
Speaker 3 (09:48):
I mean, on a practical level, how do I use
the declaration as law?
Speaker 4 (09:53):
Well, the declasion is a very broad law. A lot
of One of the things that this brings up an
interesting point. So a lot of the reason whylawyers or
judges say the decoration is not laws because they say, well,
it doesn't have any kind of.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
An enforcement mechanism.
Speaker 4 (10:05):
And usually laws say, you know, if you run the
stop sign, you'll get a ticket, you know, and there's
there's some sort of punishment involved.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
But that not all laws do that.
Speaker 4 (10:13):
Laws that say how you write a will or how
you get married, those the laws don't contain any kind
of punishment to them. And yet there's still laws, right
And in a lot of the time what law does
is it announces broad, abstract principles that the government should
aim at. For example, here's an example I use in
my in the book that's coming up soon, there's a
(10:34):
law that declares how the International Space Station program should operate,
and it says in there, in all cases, the government
shall prioritize the following considerations.
Speaker 2 (10:45):
Well, there's that's still a law, right.
Speaker 4 (10:47):
The generation of Independance is kind of like that. The
Declaration says everything the government does is legitimate only if
it respects the principles of almon are created, equal with
fundamental rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit.
Speaker 2 (10:59):
Of happiness and so forth. And that's obviously.
Speaker 4 (11:02):
The most important time that that was ever applied is
in the controversy over the Civil War, right in talking
about whether or not the Constitution guarantees slavery or not.
That turns on whether you think black people qualified as
part of the people of the United States as part
of the one people referred to in.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
The Declaration of Independence.
Speaker 4 (11:23):
And when you read Lincoln and Douglas and their debates
over the meaning of the Constitution and slavery, they're constantly
referring to the Declaration. The dread Scott opinion itself talks
about whether the Declaration of Independence means what it says,
So of course, this is a crucial element in analyzing
whether government is doing something justly, and that's why you
find the Declaration quoted in cases involving affirmative action programs
(11:46):
like the recent Harvard case. Just as Thomas says, the
Declaration of Independence is part of our law.
Speaker 2 (11:51):
It says all men are created equal.
Speaker 4 (11:53):
These kinds of racist government policies violate that principle.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (11:59):
Interesting, So I don't want to get hung up on
the point, and we need to take a break. But
so what would you say to somebody who's defending a
policy that you found to be antithetical to the themes
of the declaration? Would you declare it undeclarational or what
would do your objection sound like?
Speaker 4 (12:18):
Maybe the Declaration informs how we interpret the Constitution, which
informs how we understand the law, and so it's kind of,
you know, it's like multiple layers here. So if a
question comes up about whether something violates the equal protection
of the laws, which the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution protects,
then we look back at what do we mean by
equal protection? Do we is it okay for government to
(12:39):
give some people an advantage over others based on the
color of their skin. Well, that turns on whether what
we what do we mean by the people of the United.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
States who are citizens?
Speaker 4 (12:49):
What is the substantive values that the law is protecting
and enforcing here and understand that we have to read
the declaration and understand also the context of declaration was
written in, which is the principles of classical liberal political
philosophy that underlie the American Revolution.
Speaker 3 (13:06):
I wanted to get into that very thing, the origin
of the declaration, why was written? And why was written
the way it was in a moment or two. Tim Sandifer,
the Goldwater Institute. Much more to come an extended conversation
this hour with Tim Sanderfer, vice president for Legal Affairs
with the Goldwater Institute, about the Declaration of Independence. As
(13:29):
Independence Day approaches rapidly, Tim, this is a short segment,
and I hesitate to ask one of the big questions
in a short segment, but what the heck? Will get
started and see how it goes. Why was the Declaration
of Independence written? Why not just say I'm out listing
all those grievances. Did they just not want to make
King George mad?
Speaker 1 (13:48):
Or what? What was the purpose?
Speaker 4 (13:50):
So between the people, forget that the American Revolution was
a very long process. It actually began in seventeen sixty
four when Parliament passed law called the Sugar Act, which
was the first attempt by Parliament to impose taxes on
the colonies. And for over a decade there were these
angry disputes over Parliament's authority over the American colonies, and
(14:13):
Americans insisted that they were loyal to the King, but
not to Parliament. And they were very consistent about this,
that Parliament had no authority to.
Speaker 2 (14:21):
Pass laws over them.
Speaker 4 (14:22):
That's why Parliament isn't even mentioned in the declaration. Instead,
they used the phrase a jurisdiction. A power foreign to
our jurisdiction is the phrase they use. They don't even
want it to use Parliament's name in the Declaration of
Independence because they say it has never had any authority
over America. But the King started saying no, no, Parliament
is what governs the colonies. And so after years and
(14:45):
years of begging the king to change his mind, and
he kept ignoring them, finally he made He sent armies
to the United States started making war on Americans.
Speaker 2 (14:54):
And so they said, all right, we're.
Speaker 4 (14:55):
Done having any kind of loyalty to the king also,
and they had to issue a declar that explained why
and what they were fighting for. And so that's why
they wrote the declaration. But it was the last of
a long series of documents that explained the causes of
a dispute between America and Britain, you know. And so
you have to understand that history to get what they're
(15:17):
referring to when they list all their grievances against Parliament
and the King.
Speaker 3 (15:20):
But it seems to me it was a message to
the Crown in Parliament. It was a message to other
countries who may or may not be helpful, and a
message to the American people as well.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
Yes, and that last part is really important.
Speaker 4 (15:32):
A lot of people overlook the fact that the Continental
Congress was speaking to Americans also. They weren't just speaking
to Britain, and they weren't just speaking to France and
other countries. They were explaining to Americans themselves what it
is we're fighting over. And that's why Jefferson tried to
put in a provision damning slavery as evil, because he thought,
(15:52):
maybe if I can sneak this provision in here, it
will sort of force Americans to view slavery as un
American and that would allow enable us to later abolish slavery,
and unfortunately that tactic didn't work.
Speaker 3 (16:04):
Yeah, I want to get into that in particular next segment,
when we'll have a lot of time to stretch out.
But I think it's one of the more insidious lies
of for instance, the sixteen nineteen project that claims that
the country was founded on slavery and the founding fathers
were big fans of it. A lot of them spoke
openly of its evil and how they had to get
rid of it somehow.
Speaker 2 (16:22):
That's right, that's right.
Speaker 3 (16:24):
Tim Sanver of the Goldwater Institute on the line. We
are going to come back after a brief break full
of fascinating and helpful commercial messages and continue on our
discussion of the declaration of Independence. I want to get
into Thomas Jefferson's role, what got left out, who fought
for what, because like every process that's ever happened in
(16:46):
this country, it was full of bloody knuckles and differing
opinions and that sort of thing, which is why I
love this place so much. And Tim also mentioned that
he's working on a book soon to come out about
the Declaration of Independence. I'm for the anniversary thereof, so
we will discuss that and much more. Also get back
to some of the Supreme Court decisions and check in
(17:07):
with Jack from Sonny Humid, Florida. I think before long
stay with us.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
Glad you're here. Thanks, Armstrong and Getty. Welcome.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
Tim Sanderfers the vice president for Legal Affairs with the
Goldwater Institute, longtime friend of the Armstrong and Getty show.
And we're doing a slightly premature independence stage show just
because we are off next week and I really really
wanted to, so here we are. I was centering the
discussion i'd planned to around Tim's twenty fourteen book, The
Conscience of the Constitution, The Declaration of Independence, and the
(17:41):
Right to Liberty, But he unleashed on us the news
that you're working on a new book on a somewhat
similar topic.
Speaker 4 (17:49):
Yes, I'm doing a book called Proclaiming Liberty, which is
about the writing of the Declaration, what it means, and
then you know, going clause by clause to the Declaration,
explaining what each of the references are, and then concludes
with sort of a my slap at the sixteen nineteen
project should be out in April of twenty twenty six
in Times for the bisis Sessquit Tenniel whatever they call.
Speaker 3 (18:11):
Them, right right, Yeah, give the sixteen nineteen project a
good solid slap if you can. We mentioned just before
the break, Tim mentioned that Thomas Jefferson, who allegedly wrote
the Declaration of Independence, wanted a clause in there about
the need to eliminate slavery, which it runs so counter
to some of the woke narratives these days. First of all,
(18:35):
to what extent was this a solo writing project by
Thomas Jefferson?
Speaker 1 (18:41):
And what else was fought over? What to leave in,
what to leave out? What should we know?
Speaker 2 (18:45):
Oh?
Speaker 4 (18:46):
Yeah, So it's a wonderful and complicated story, which I'll
get into in my book. But yes, Jefferson was the
primary draftsman on a committee of five, and really it
was primarily him. John Adams and Benjamin Franklin were primarily
responsible for Franklin was six, so he was working from
home and so they didn't really consult him very often,
and so it was primarily Jefferson and Adams, and Jefferson did.
Speaker 2 (19:07):
The first draft.
Speaker 4 (19:08):
He wrote it in about two weeks and you know,
got or two days, I'm sorry, and had it all
ready to present to them, and then they added and
took some things out, and then presented it to the
Congress as a whole, which then went over it all
over again, editing it, taking things out and putting things
and all that sort of stuff. And he had wanted
to include an attack on the slave trade. Jefferson when
(19:29):
he was he was already young. He was one of
the youngest members of the Continental Congress in seventy six.
But even before that he had been in his colonial legislature,
and he had tried to get laws passed restricting the
trade in slaves as a first step to attacking slavery itself.
And because you know, you got to get your camel's
(19:50):
nose under the tent, right, And that was the plan.
And that failed because the King issued in order saying
colonies made not pass any kinds of restrictions on the
importation of slaves, because he said, because that harmed the
profits of the Royal Africa Company, which was the Imperial
Slave Trade Corporation. And so when he got a chance
(20:13):
to write the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson says, well, I'm
going to include an attack on the King for blocking
our efforts to limit the slave trade. And what he
wrote was the single longest passage in the Declaration of
really passionate paragraphs. I mean, he's using all capital letters
and underlining things because he was really into this, and
he was partly hoping to persuade his fellow Americans to
(20:35):
see slavery as an evil thing that could be blamed
on Britain. Now today we say, oh, how silly for
him to blame Britain for providing Americans with slaves when
Americans bought slaves perfectly, happily.
Speaker 2 (20:47):
Well, that's kind of true. But look at our own day.
Look what we do.
Speaker 4 (20:51):
Today Nowadays, we blame oil companies for global warming. We
blame fast food companies for making us fat. We blame
tobacco companies for selling us cigarettes.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
It's basically the same thing.
Speaker 4 (21:02):
It's blaming the company for providing you with the evil thing.
As a matter of political rhetoric, it was just a
handy technique that Jefferson was trying to get away with,
and Adams and Franklin liked it, but unfortunately the rest
of the Congress did and they took it out. And
Jefferson was so upset about this that for years afterwards
he could. He sent copies of his original draft with
a bunch of friends and he said, didn't you think.
(21:23):
I think it's better the way I wrote it, And
even in his memoirs when he was retired, he did
the same thing. He put his original version in there
as a way of saying, look what I tried to
do and what they wouldn't let me do.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
You know, obviously getting the southern colonies to go around
and go along and satified was it was an ever
present concern too, I would guess, yeah.
Speaker 4 (21:42):
Because the most important thing, above all else was to
keep all of the colonies united. If one colony peeled
away and said well we're going to make a separate
priest with Britain, that would have been a disaster, because
then another colony, another colonue pretty soon there would be
no way of fighting back.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
He gets written.
Speaker 4 (21:59):
So no, South Carolina and Georgia, according to Jefferson, were
really anti really opposed to his anti slavery passage, and
a few of the northern states he said too. Oh,
he didn't say which ones, and so it was taken
out because he had to have unanimity. That was the
most important thing.
Speaker 3 (22:15):
I'm so intrigued by your mention of Ben Franklin's role
in the process, though he was sick and it was
somewhat limited. I think most Americans have a view of
Ben as sort of a learned godfather of witty sayings
and occasional scientific discoveries. And then he went to France
and had a big party and represented us. But how
(22:36):
would you describe Franklin's role there in the very early
days pre declaration and post.
Speaker 4 (22:43):
And Franklin started out as a really as loving the
connection between England and America.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
He thought that was really valuable and wonderful and important.
Speaker 4 (22:52):
And he gradually came to see that Britain viewed the
colonies as subordinate and the colony and that Britain thought
of the colonists as their job was to work, pay
taxes and shut up. And that started to really great
on Franklin over the years, and eventually he became one
of the most intense throw independence guys. He was, you know,
(23:15):
famously disowned his own son, who was the royal governor
of the Colony of New Jersey, and disowned him for
siding with the king over America.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
So this was not this is not just a lovely
grandfather figure. He was very passionate revolutionary.
Speaker 3 (23:31):
Right, And I remember, I can't remember where it was
that I read about it, but I was somewhat surprised
to read of the overt, shameless bigotry of a lot
of Brits, and specifically British troops who came to pacify
the colonies. They actually looked at us quote unquote as
a bunch of loud, idiotic roubs.
Speaker 4 (23:53):
Yeah, a lot of the officers especially, and you know,
with some there is some legitimacy to that. I mean,
the Americans work country pumpkins. But on the other hand,
we were the ones doing the working and the fighting
and having to pay the taxes. And then have a
bunch of aristocrats who were sent over here a lot
of time, these, especially the royal governors who were sent
over to govern, A lot of them were just, you know,
(24:15):
some kind of aristocrat who had gone bankrupt and needed
to get away from his creditors and would come over
to America to rule for his own wealth.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
I mean, the governor of Virginia was quite open.
Speaker 4 (24:25):
Governor Dunmore was quite open about the fact that he
had come to America to make a fortune because he
needed money from the old country, you know. So, and
then a lot of time these governors wouldn't even come
to America. Virginia, for example, was governed by for almost
a decade by a governor who never even bothered to
visit Virginia. The British colonial policy was crazy and it
(24:47):
was very oppressive. You know, there was no freedom of speech.
You could be executed for expressing your political views in
a newspaper. Your property basically existed at the wheel of parliament.
If Parliament decided to take your stuff way, they claimed
literally absolute power. And in fact, that's the most important
thing that led to the revolution. Parliament passed a law
(25:07):
in seventeen sixty six called the Declaratory Act that said
that Parliament had the authority to legislate for the colonies
quote in all cases whatsoever end quote Wow, And that
ends up yeah, right, that line ends up in the
Declaration of Independence, because that's really the source of all
the other problems. Right, if they can legislate for us
in all cases whatsoever, then your property rights and your
(25:30):
free speech rights and your freedom of religion counting, and
you really are a save.
Speaker 3 (25:34):
If that's the case, what do you think is most
underappreciated about the Declaration of Independence.
Speaker 4 (25:41):
Oh, that's a great question. I think it's probably people
don't know what the grievances referred to they read. If
you read the declaration, it says, you know, it has
those beautiful opening paragraphs about Amini created equal to these things,
and then it lists the things that Britain has done,
and they're written in kind of general terms, like the
first one, you know, the king has he has refused
(26:02):
his assent to laws the most wholesome and necessary for
the public good.
Speaker 2 (26:06):
And people don't know.
Speaker 4 (26:07):
What they're talking about that day is and what it
is is actually Britain claim the King's deputy claimed the
authority to veto any colonial legislation. And they did this
a lot. I mean, for example, it was illegal to
get a divorce in the colonies. The colonies weren't allowed
to pass laws for divorce. You had to get the
king's own permission to get a divorce in colonial America.
(26:28):
But of course the most important one is laws banning
the slave trade.
Speaker 2 (26:31):
The King said no to any of those.
Speaker 4 (26:33):
People don't know this history, and it's starting to fade,
and that leads to this general impression of well, the
British rule over America wasn't really so bad? Well, were
the patriots were just a bunch of whiners? And this
which really ticks me.
Speaker 3 (26:45):
Off right and also in the particulars I think, and
this gets back to the theme that we began with
that it's Tim's fervent belief that the Declaration of Independence
is indeed law in an important United States law founding
document in the truest sense as you get into the
particulars and work through them, and maybe Jefferson should have
(27:07):
had footnotes, but it further illustrates what sort of country
we did not want to be and what we wanted
to be in a fair amount of detail. Because it's
easy enough and sometimes funny to portray it as the
king's jerk and we don't want to be under him anymore.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
We're going to start a new country.
Speaker 3 (27:26):
But the thought of what sort of country was thought
out very very carefully.
Speaker 4 (27:32):
Oh yeah, there's a lot of political philosophy that's distilled
into the Declaration of Independence. And I mentioned that there
was well over a decade of political arguments that had
gone on before independence. There had been a First Continental Congress,
and they had also issued a declaration, and if you
read their declaration, they actually list by number the particular
(27:52):
parliamentary laws that they're objecting to, so they get into
a great deal of details. And there were pamphlets and
speeches that talked about to go philosophy, and Jefferson's distilling
this all down into a single page because he wants
it to be easy to read and understand. But we're
talking about ideas that go back to ancient Greece and
ancient Rome in the declaration, so to really get a
(28:13):
grasp of that, it requires a good deal of depth,
which you know, of course, our educational institutions don't give
students nowadays because we're all supposed to believe that the
Founders are just these evil white guys who wanted to
wanted independence because they wanted to perpetuate slavery, which is
a complete lie.
Speaker 3 (28:28):
Of course, right forgive me if this is inaccurate, but
I think Jack mentioned that one of his sons knew
all about Sesar Chefz, who was an admirable fellow in
a lot of ways, but knew nothing about Thomas Jefferson,
which is, yeah, the.
Speaker 2 (28:39):
Only thing people know about Jefferson is Sally Hemmings Noday.
Speaker 1 (28:42):
Yeah, what's your favorite Jefferson biography?
Speaker 4 (28:45):
By the way, Alf Mapp m App he wrote two volumes.
The first one is called Thomas Jefferson A Strange Case
of Mistaken Identity, and the second volume is called Thomas
Jefferson Passionate Pilgrim. And that's my favorite biography if you
only want to one volume biography. I really like the
John Meachim biography that came out a few years ago.
Speaker 2 (29:05):
The only thing wrong with it is the title.
Speaker 4 (29:06):
It's called The Pursuit of Power, which is a crazy
title because Jefferson did not pursue power, and the book
makes clear that Jefferson did not pursue power. I don't
know why they called it that. Incidentally, talking about books,
I want to mention you. You know you mentioned about
the Declaration setting forth the ideas of the New Country.
So clearly there was a great book that came out
what thirty years ago now called The Radicalism of the
(29:29):
American Revolution by a historian named Gordon Wood. And it
is a hugely important book, very famous in history circles
because it shows just how rapidly and extensively the idea
of equality transformed American culture that within a single lifetime,
people went from a sleepy colonial society where you know,
(29:50):
you had to take your hat off to somebody who
was higher than you on the socials ladder to a
bustling industrial country with railroads and democracy and all these
sort of thing. And it's a very It really tells
the story beautifully, and I would really strongly recommend it
because a lot of people think, oh, well it was
you know, it was a very conservative revolution.
Speaker 2 (30:09):
It wasn't. It was a radical revolution in many ways.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
Great.
Speaker 3 (30:13):
I hear the audience shouting, wait, wait, I'm trying to
write this down. So Tim, if you could text that
to me, your executive producer Hanson, we will post it
at Armstrong and getdy dot com so you can find
it easily. One more segment with Tim Sandafer the Goldwater
Institute coming up.
Speaker 1 (30:26):
Stay with us.
Speaker 3 (30:31):
The final segment with Tim Sandifer of the Goldwater Institute.
It's our Independence Day show a little bit early and Tim,
one of the main reasons I wanted to do this
is I've come to believe that the idea of liberty
has become like the furniture the background of our national discussions.
We've got the people and the food, and there's a
(30:51):
TV going in the corner, and sometimes somebody mentions liberty.
Speaker 1 (30:54):
But we don't teach it.
Speaker 3 (30:56):
We don't teach enthusiasm for it, reverence for it. I
think maybe it's my generation that's at fault. We just
assumed that everybody would always love liberty and want to
defend it, and I've become convinced that's not the case.
And so I've become a bit of a zelot for
trying to do that. So thanks for helping. We're talking
about you.
Speaker 2 (31:13):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (31:15):
Oh yeah, goodness. I try to stop me. But we've
been talking about the Declaration of Independence. Excited to hear
that Tim has a book on that topic coming out
before too terribly long. My daughter went to undergrad at
George Mason University, and I knew the name, and I thought, oh,
George Mason, and I'd started doing some reading and realized
that he, in my mind, is one of your great
(31:35):
underrated founding fathers. Who are your favorite underrated founding fathers?
Speaker 4 (31:41):
Well, I would agree with you about not enough people
knowing about George Mason. He was the author of the
very first Declaration of Rights or the very first Bill
of Rights in America, the Virginia of Rights, and he
was the mentor of George Washington and an elder statesman
that Jefferson and all the others looked up to a
really great years ago, I was at a conference in Washington, DC.
Speaker 2 (32:03):
This is when I was in college.
Speaker 4 (32:04):
As a conference, it was a week long conference, but
we had one day off to go explore a town.
And so I came down that morning and I'm sitting
at the breakfast table and a bunch of these other
college students sitting around, and Uh, I was planning on
going to George Mason's house, which is just a little
south of Washington, d C. And I hear them talking
about what they're going to do, and I'm just sitting
(32:26):
there quietly. I hear one of them say, where are
you gonna Where are you gonna go? And the other
one said, I'm going to Uh, I'm going to go
to Jamestown. And I thought, wow, that's that's kind of far.
And then the first one says, well, what's that and
the other one says, that's where the Pilgrims landed. So
I had to I said I'm sorry. I said, I'm sorry,
But the pilgrims landed in Massachusetts. You're thinking of Jamestown
(32:48):
is is is quite a distance from here, and I
don't think you could really get there in time. And
they go, wow, you really know this stuff. Where are
you going to go? And I said, well, I'm going
to Gunston Hall blank blank stairs. I said that that
was George Mason's house, blank stairs. And one of them,
one of them turns to the other says, I'm really embarrassed.
I don't know who George Mason was. I go to
George Mason University. So I made them go with me.
(33:13):
I ordered them to come with me, and we all
three went down to see Gunston Hall.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
Oh that's great, all right? Who else?
Speaker 4 (33:21):
My other favorite totally unknown founding Father's got named Heim
Solomon H.
Speaker 2 (33:26):
J Y M. Solomon.
Speaker 4 (33:27):
He was a Polish Jew who came to America and
became a financier and was a spy for the for
the Patriots. Was captured twice by the British for spying
and managed to escape, and later on became a prominent
banker and lender who helped to finance the Revolution, in
part by by directly paying people like James Madison when
(33:50):
they weren't getting their paychecks from from home, you know,
mail was slow, so he would just give them money
to pay their rent. He died bankrupt because he gave
away all of his money to the American cause. There's
a statue of him in Chicago, and he you know,
and he was very much of the view that America,
because of religious freedom, was the promised land for Jews.
(34:11):
And I'm getting moved even talking about.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
It because he was. He was a great hero we
all should remember.
Speaker 3 (34:17):
Yeah, wow, that is fantastic in moving. This stuff is
not over studied. It's understudied and underappreciated, especially now. Tim,
Thanks so much for the time, and back to work
on that dang book. Years. I know you have so
little ready to do what for advocating for liberty with
the Goldwater Institute. Tim, great to talk to you. Best
(34:40):
to the missus and we will talk again soon.
Speaker 2 (34:43):
Thank you, see you later.
Speaker 1 (34:44):
All right. Yep.
Speaker 3 (34:45):
Jack is going to join us in the next hour
from Florida. I think I think they're already there on vacation,
but he is. He already has stories to tell, probably
alligator related. I'm looking forward to that. If you happen
to not get our four of the show, or you
got to go do something.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
That's fine. Just subscribe to our podcast, Armstrong and Getty.
Speaker 3 (35:05):
On demand and the radio show is available to you
whenever you want it. We'll also hit some of the
news of the day because there's a good bit of it.
Speaker 1 (35:14):
And goodness knows, whatever comes. Oh, Clips of the Week.
Speaker 3 (35:17):
We have a super bonus Clips of the Week for
you to kick off next hour. Stay tuned if you can.
Tom McClintock, Congressman, will join us as well. Armstrong and
Getty
Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio the George
Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Armstrong and Jettie and He Armstrong and Yetty.
Speaker 3 (00:24):
Goodness sakes, what a day. The crew has taken the
week off next week to enjoy Independence Day in a
little summer fun, family time.
Speaker 1 (00:34):
Travel, etc.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
Today is the last show obviously, before that Jack is
winging his way toward Florida with his boys, and I
decided I would love to talk to Tim Sander for
the Vice President for Legal Affairs at the Goldwater Institute
about the Declaration of Independence. Independence Day and one of
my favorite books. Tim wrote, The Conscience of the Constitution,
(00:58):
the Declaration of Independent and it's in the right to
liberty and by coincidence, today is also the day that
the Supreme Court is handing out rulings right and left.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Tim Sander for joys Is, Tim, how are you.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
I'm just great. Thanks for having me back.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
Oh, it's always a pleasure.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
Have you gotten a chance to take in some of
the Scotis' recent issuances.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
I had to skim some of them, and.
Speaker 4 (01:22):
This universal injunction decision is really unfortunate. It's a bad ruling,
and honestly, it's a really stupid ruling because here's the
thing so universal injunctions. That's when a plaintiff goes to
court and says the government is doing something unconstitutional, and
the judge says, that's right, the government must stop doing
(01:43):
this unconstitutional thing. That's a universal injunction. What the opponents
of universal injunctions complain about is they say, well, why
should a judge in California be able to bar the
federal government from doing something in Florida. And the answer
to that is because it's unconstitutional. What the ruling today
says is now the California federal judge can only issue
(02:05):
a ruling barring the unconstitutional thing from happening to the
particular people in that particular lawsuit. Well, of course, that's
how injunctions work anyway. So all that this ruling says
today is that the judge has to write in his opinion,
I'm only saying this applies to the plaintiffs in this lawsuit. Well,
of course, everybody knows that's already the rule. It's just
(02:25):
that the federal government has to follow the law. So
if it's doing something in Florida, that's unconstitutional in California.
It's still unconstitutional wherever it's happening, so it's illegal. So
it's really just creating this weird new formality in how
courts go about enforcing the Constitution and justice. Jackson, in
her dissenting opinion, has it exactly right. She says, now
(02:45):
a court's power to prevent constitutional violations comes with an asterisk.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
A court can make.
Speaker 4 (02:51):
The executive cease its unconstitutional conduct asterisk, but only with
respect to the particular plaintiffs named in the lawsuit before them,
being the government free to violate the constitutional rights of
anyone and everyone else.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
It's a terrible thing, and it's just anyway. It's frustrating
by it.
Speaker 4 (03:09):
No, because there's been a lot of talk among the
conservative legal community about trying to stop nationwide injunctions because
a lot of conservative lawyers and judges are scared of
what they call activist judges. I am not scared of
activist judges. I'm scared of judges getting things wrong, whether
it be conservative or liberal judges getting things wrong. But activists,
(03:30):
there's no It's much worse to have a passive judge
who does nothing right. That's much worse when the government
does something unconstitutional and you go to a judge that
get them to stop, and the judge says, oh, I'm
not I'm just gonna let them do whatever.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
I'm not going to be active. That's terrible.
Speaker 4 (03:46):
That's Kilo versus New London, right where the government comes
along and steals your house to hand over to Kyo
or something, and the court stands back and refuses to
host the constitution.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
That's a passive judge. That's not what we want.
Speaker 4 (03:58):
We want judges to be active in enforcing the constitution.
We don't want them to be wrong, of course, but
we don't want the Congress or the president to.
Speaker 2 (04:05):
Be wrong either.
Speaker 4 (04:06):
So the idea that what we want is a passive,
non activist judiciary is just crazy.
Speaker 1 (04:12):
Right.
Speaker 3 (04:12):
So, people who object to the high number of these
injunctions and how they've interfered with federal policy, that's in quotes.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
I mean, you can agree with that or not.
Speaker 3 (04:22):
The answer is that's why we have the appeals process,
and it'll be fine, just give it a little time.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
Yep, exactly.
Speaker 4 (04:28):
And the reason why we have so many of these
injunctions going on right now is because the president is
doing so many unconstitutional things.
Speaker 3 (04:34):
That's why, Oh, look at you say. If you expected pandering,
you're not going to get it here. So the specific
reason I invited Tim to be on the show today
is we're leading up to Independence Day July fourth, and
I know how much you like to talk about the
Declaration of Independence liberty in general, and one of my
(04:56):
favorite books of years, as I mentioned, was The Conscience
of the Constitution, which, to my horror, came out like
eleven years ago. I know, why did you write the book?
What argument are you making?
Speaker 4 (05:09):
Well, So for I'll preface this by saying, if you
like this book, you'll be excited to know I've got
a new book about the Declaration of Independence that's schedule
to come out next year, in time for the universtieth anniversary.
I just finished what I hope is the final draft
of it, and I hope people will read and enjoy
it about the history of the declaration and what exactly
are all of the grievances talking about, and what exactly
(05:32):
Britain was doing, because it really bothers me that people say, oh,
it's just a fight over a text on tea, and
they ignore that British colonial rule really was oppressive and tyrannical.
Speaker 2 (05:42):
But that aside.
Speaker 4 (05:44):
The reason I wrote Conscience of the Constitution is to
argue that the Declaration of Independence isn't just a piece
of political rhetoric. It's law. It's the law of the land.
It is as much the law as the Federal Constitution
itself is law. And we tend to kind of shrug
that aside for a couple of reasons. In fact, worse
(06:04):
than that, when Barrett was at her confirmation hearing, she
was directly asked, is the Declaration of Independence law? And
she answered no, Well, she would have flunked MI con
law class for some of that. The Declaration of Independence
is a statute. It was passed by the Continental Congress.
It's in the Statute Books, Volume one, page one of
(06:25):
the United States Code, Declaration of Independence.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
And for good reason.
Speaker 4 (06:29):
It sets forth the principles that make our government justify
that make it a legitimate government instead of just an
arbitrary rule. And those principles are equality of rights, individual liberty,
limited government, the people rule, and so forth.
Speaker 3 (06:46):
How do you suppose somebody is learned and intelligent as
justice Barrett would come to that conclusion.
Speaker 4 (06:53):
Well, so I mentioned earlier that a lot of our
conservative friends are so scared about judicial activism, and so
they think the way to fight back against judicial activism
is to say that judges are never supposed to draw
any kind.
Speaker 2 (07:06):
Of moral or normative distinctions.
Speaker 4 (07:10):
That judges are supposed to be just as Chief Tess
Robert said, we're just umpires calling balls and strikes. And
that theory is that the Constitution has no moral direction
to it, that it's just sort of this value neutral
framework for democracy, and that's not correct. The Declaration of
Independence tells us that the Constitution has a moral direction
(07:33):
to it, and that is that individual freedom is the
primary political value, not democracy. And today we're so propagandized
to to believe that democracy is the most important thing
about our system that we forget that, in fact, the
word democracy doesn't even appear in the Constitution of the
United States. On the contrary, the reason we have a
(07:55):
constitution is to limit democracy, to prioritize individual rights over
majority rule.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
But because that seems to lead to judicial activism, a
lot of our.
Speaker 4 (08:07):
Conservative lawyers and judges don't like the Declaration of Independence,
particularly Justice Scalia. Justice Scalia had this sort of fight
with Thomas over this issue.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Thomas is a pro Declaration.
Speaker 4 (08:19):
Of Independence justice and Scalia was anti Declaration of Independence.
And the reason why was because Scalia thought it led
to judicial activism. And Justice Thomas believes, at least to
some degree, in natural rights, that there really are individual
rights and government must respect those in all cases. And
so there's a very interesting opinion. They were called Troxel
versus Granville, where Scalia agreed with Thomas except for two sentences,
(08:45):
and he specifically said he did not agree with those
two sentences, and those are the two sentences where Justice
Thomas quotes the Declaration of Independence. So it's really this
is not just a bunch of abstract theorizing. This relates
to how the government actually operates in daily, day to
day work. Whether you believe, really believe in the principles
of the declaration, or whether you just recite them without
thinking what they mean.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
Right, And I certainly count myself among those who believe
in the principles fervently. I don't know exactly how to
ask this question, but on a practical level, you said,
you know, the Declaration is a law. The first Really,
on a practical level, as I look at the truths
(09:27):
that we hold to be self evident that all men
are created equal, that they aren't doubted by their creator,
with certain unalienable rights, among these life, liberty, and the
pursuit of happiness. Do I then look at everything that
happened after that through the lens of that declaration and
assess whether it holds true.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
To those principles or not.
Speaker 3 (09:48):
I mean, on a practical level, how do I use
the declaration as law?
Speaker 4 (09:53):
Well, the declasion is a very broad law. A lot
of One of the things that this brings up an
interesting point. So a lot of the reason whylawyers or
judges say the decoration is not laws because they say, well,
it doesn't have any kind of.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
An enforcement mechanism.
Speaker 4 (10:05):
And usually laws say, you know, if you run the
stop sign, you'll get a ticket, you know, and there's
there's some sort of punishment involved.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
But that not all laws do that.
Speaker 4 (10:13):
Laws that say how you write a will or how
you get married, those the laws don't contain any kind
of punishment to them. And yet there's still laws, right
And in a lot of the time what law does
is it announces broad, abstract principles that the government should
aim at. For example, here's an example I use in
my in the book that's coming up soon, there's a
(10:34):
law that declares how the International Space Station program should operate,
and it says in there, in all cases, the government
shall prioritize the following considerations.
Speaker 2 (10:45):
Well, there's that's still a law, right.
Speaker 4 (10:47):
The generation of Independance is kind of like that. The
Declaration says everything the government does is legitimate only if
it respects the principles of almon are created, equal with
fundamental rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit.
Speaker 2 (10:59):
Of happiness and so forth. And that's obviously.
Speaker 4 (11:02):
The most important time that that was ever applied is
in the controversy over the Civil War, right in talking
about whether or not the Constitution guarantees slavery or not.
That turns on whether you think black people qualified as
part of the people of the United States as part
of the one people referred to in.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
The Declaration of Independence.
Speaker 4 (11:23):
And when you read Lincoln and Douglas and their debates
over the meaning of the Constitution and slavery, they're constantly
referring to the Declaration. The dread Scott opinion itself talks
about whether the Declaration of Independence means what it says,
So of course, this is a crucial element in analyzing
whether government is doing something justly, and that's why you
find the Declaration quoted in cases involving affirmative action programs
(11:46):
like the recent Harvard case. Just as Thomas says, the
Declaration of Independence is part of our law.
Speaker 2 (11:51):
It says all men are created equal.
Speaker 4 (11:53):
These kinds of racist government policies violate that principle.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (11:59):
Interesting, So I don't want to get hung up on
the point, and we need to take a break. But
so what would you say to somebody who's defending a
policy that you found to be antithetical to the themes
of the declaration? Would you declare it undeclarational or what
would do your objection sound like?
Speaker 4 (12:18):
Maybe the Declaration informs how we interpret the Constitution, which
informs how we understand the law, and so it's kind of,
you know, it's like multiple layers here. So if a
question comes up about whether something violates the equal protection
of the laws, which the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution protects,
then we look back at what do we mean by
equal protection? Do we is it okay for government to
(12:39):
give some people an advantage over others based on the
color of their skin. Well, that turns on whether what
we what do we mean by the people of the United.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
States who are citizens?
Speaker 4 (12:49):
What is the substantive values that the law is protecting
and enforcing here and understand that we have to read
the declaration and understand also the context of declaration was
written in, which is the principles of classical liberal political
philosophy that underlie the American Revolution.
Speaker 3 (13:06):
I wanted to get into that very thing, the origin
of the declaration, why was written? And why was written
the way it was in a moment or two. Tim Sandifer,
the Goldwater Institute. Much more to come an extended conversation
this hour with Tim Sanderfer, vice president for Legal Affairs
with the Goldwater Institute, about the Declaration of Independence. As
(13:29):
Independence Day approaches rapidly, Tim, this is a short segment,
and I hesitate to ask one of the big questions
in a short segment, but what the heck? Will get
started and see how it goes. Why was the Declaration
of Independence written? Why not just say I'm out listing
all those grievances. Did they just not want to make
King George mad?
Speaker 1 (13:48):
Or what? What was the purpose?
Speaker 4 (13:50):
So between the people, forget that the American Revolution was
a very long process. It actually began in seventeen sixty
four when Parliament passed law called the Sugar Act, which
was the first attempt by Parliament to impose taxes on
the colonies. And for over a decade there were these
angry disputes over Parliament's authority over the American colonies, and
(14:13):
Americans insisted that they were loyal to the King, but
not to Parliament. And they were very consistent about this,
that Parliament had no authority to.
Speaker 2 (14:21):
Pass laws over them.
Speaker 4 (14:22):
That's why Parliament isn't even mentioned in the declaration. Instead,
they used the phrase a jurisdiction. A power foreign to
our jurisdiction is the phrase they use. They don't even
want it to use Parliament's name in the Declaration of
Independence because they say it has never had any authority
over America. But the King started saying no, no, Parliament
is what governs the colonies. And so after years and
(14:45):
years of begging the king to change his mind, and
he kept ignoring them, finally he made He sent armies
to the United States started making war on Americans.
Speaker 2 (14:54):
And so they said, all right, we're.
Speaker 4 (14:55):
Done having any kind of loyalty to the king also,
and they had to issue a declar that explained why
and what they were fighting for. And so that's why
they wrote the declaration. But it was the last of
a long series of documents that explained the causes of
a dispute between America and Britain, you know. And so
you have to understand that history to get what they're
(15:17):
referring to when they list all their grievances against Parliament
and the King.
Speaker 3 (15:20):
But it seems to me it was a message to
the Crown in Parliament. It was a message to other
countries who may or may not be helpful, and a
message to the American people as well.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
Yes, and that last part is really important.
Speaker 4 (15:32):
A lot of people overlook the fact that the Continental
Congress was speaking to Americans also. They weren't just speaking
to Britain, and they weren't just speaking to France and
other countries. They were explaining to Americans themselves what it
is we're fighting over. And that's why Jefferson tried to
put in a provision damning slavery as evil, because he thought,
(15:52):
maybe if I can sneak this provision in here, it
will sort of force Americans to view slavery as un
American and that would allow enable us to later abolish slavery,
and unfortunately that tactic didn't work.
Speaker 3 (16:04):
Yeah, I want to get into that in particular next segment,
when we'll have a lot of time to stretch out.
But I think it's one of the more insidious lies
of for instance, the sixteen nineteen project that claims that
the country was founded on slavery and the founding fathers
were big fans of it. A lot of them spoke
openly of its evil and how they had to get
rid of it somehow.
Speaker 2 (16:22):
That's right, that's right.
Speaker 3 (16:24):
Tim Sanver of the Goldwater Institute on the line. We
are going to come back after a brief break full
of fascinating and helpful commercial messages and continue on our
discussion of the declaration of Independence. I want to get
into Thomas Jefferson's role, what got left out, who fought
for what, because like every process that's ever happened in
(16:46):
this country, it was full of bloody knuckles and differing
opinions and that sort of thing, which is why I
love this place so much. And Tim also mentioned that
he's working on a book soon to come out about
the Declaration of Independence. I'm for the anniversary thereof, so
we will discuss that and much more. Also get back
to some of the Supreme Court decisions and check in
(17:07):
with Jack from Sonny Humid, Florida. I think before long
stay with us.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
Glad you're here. Thanks, Armstrong and Getty. Welcome.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
Tim Sanderfers the vice president for Legal Affairs with the
Goldwater Institute, longtime friend of the Armstrong and Getty show.
And we're doing a slightly premature independence stage show just
because we are off next week and I really really
wanted to, so here we are. I was centering the
discussion i'd planned to around Tim's twenty fourteen book, The
Conscience of the Constitution, The Declaration of Independence, and the
(17:41):
Right to Liberty, But he unleashed on us the news
that you're working on a new book on a somewhat
similar topic.
Speaker 4 (17:49):
Yes, I'm doing a book called Proclaiming Liberty, which is
about the writing of the Declaration, what it means, and
then you know, going clause by clause to the Declaration,
explaining what each of the references are, and then concludes
with sort of a my slap at the sixteen nineteen
project should be out in April of twenty twenty six
in Times for the bisis Sessquit Tenniel whatever they call.
Speaker 3 (18:11):
Them, right right, Yeah, give the sixteen nineteen project a
good solid slap if you can. We mentioned just before
the break, Tim mentioned that Thomas Jefferson, who allegedly wrote
the Declaration of Independence, wanted a clause in there about
the need to eliminate slavery, which it runs so counter
to some of the woke narratives these days. First of all,
(18:35):
to what extent was this a solo writing project by
Thomas Jefferson?
Speaker 1 (18:41):
And what else was fought over? What to leave in,
what to leave out? What should we know?
Speaker 2 (18:45):
Oh?
Speaker 4 (18:46):
Yeah, So it's a wonderful and complicated story, which I'll
get into in my book. But yes, Jefferson was the
primary draftsman on a committee of five, and really it
was primarily him. John Adams and Benjamin Franklin were primarily
responsible for Franklin was six, so he was working from
home and so they didn't really consult him very often,
and so it was primarily Jefferson and Adams, and Jefferson did.
Speaker 2 (19:07):
The first draft.
Speaker 4 (19:08):
He wrote it in about two weeks and you know,
got or two days, I'm sorry, and had it all
ready to present to them, and then they added and
took some things out, and then presented it to the
Congress as a whole, which then went over it all
over again, editing it, taking things out and putting things
and all that sort of stuff. And he had wanted
to include an attack on the slave trade. Jefferson when
(19:29):
he was he was already young. He was one of
the youngest members of the Continental Congress in seventy six.
But even before that he had been in his colonial legislature,
and he had tried to get laws passed restricting the
trade in slaves as a first step to attacking slavery itself.
And because you know, you got to get your camel's
(19:50):
nose under the tent, right, And that was the plan.
And that failed because the King issued in order saying
colonies made not pass any kinds of restrictions on the
importation of slaves, because he said, because that harmed the
profits of the Royal Africa Company, which was the Imperial
Slave Trade Corporation. And so when he got a chance
(20:13):
to write the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson says, well, I'm
going to include an attack on the King for blocking
our efforts to limit the slave trade. And what he
wrote was the single longest passage in the Declaration of
really passionate paragraphs. I mean, he's using all capital letters
and underlining things because he was really into this, and
he was partly hoping to persuade his fellow Americans to
(20:35):
see slavery as an evil thing that could be blamed
on Britain. Now today we say, oh, how silly for
him to blame Britain for providing Americans with slaves when
Americans bought slaves perfectly, happily.
Speaker 2 (20:47):
Well, that's kind of true. But look at our own day.
Look what we do.
Speaker 4 (20:51):
Today Nowadays, we blame oil companies for global warming. We
blame fast food companies for making us fat. We blame
tobacco companies for selling us cigarettes.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
It's basically the same thing.
Speaker 4 (21:02):
It's blaming the company for providing you with the evil thing.
As a matter of political rhetoric, it was just a
handy technique that Jefferson was trying to get away with,
and Adams and Franklin liked it, but unfortunately the rest
of the Congress did and they took it out. And
Jefferson was so upset about this that for years afterwards
he could. He sent copies of his original draft with
a bunch of friends and he said, didn't you think.
(21:23):
I think it's better the way I wrote it, And
even in his memoirs when he was retired, he did
the same thing. He put his original version in there
as a way of saying, look what I tried to
do and what they wouldn't let me do.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
You know, obviously getting the southern colonies to go around
and go along and satified was it was an ever
present concern too, I would guess, yeah.
Speaker 4 (21:42):
Because the most important thing, above all else was to
keep all of the colonies united. If one colony peeled
away and said well we're going to make a separate
priest with Britain, that would have been a disaster, because
then another colony, another colonue pretty soon there would be
no way of fighting back.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
He gets written.
Speaker 4 (21:59):
So no, South Carolina and Georgia, according to Jefferson, were
really anti really opposed to his anti slavery passage, and
a few of the northern states he said too. Oh,
he didn't say which ones, and so it was taken
out because he had to have unanimity. That was the
most important thing.
Speaker 3 (22:15):
I'm so intrigued by your mention of Ben Franklin's role
in the process, though he was sick and it was
somewhat limited. I think most Americans have a view of
Ben as sort of a learned godfather of witty sayings
and occasional scientific discoveries. And then he went to France
and had a big party and represented us. But how
(22:36):
would you describe Franklin's role there in the very early
days pre declaration and post.
Speaker 4 (22:43):
And Franklin started out as a really as loving the
connection between England and America.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
He thought that was really valuable and wonderful and important.
Speaker 4 (22:52):
And he gradually came to see that Britain viewed the
colonies as subordinate and the colony and that Britain thought
of the colonists as their job was to work, pay
taxes and shut up. And that started to really great
on Franklin over the years, and eventually he became one
of the most intense throw independence guys. He was, you know,
(23:15):
famously disowned his own son, who was the royal governor
of the Colony of New Jersey, and disowned him for
siding with the king over America.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
So this was not this is not just a lovely
grandfather figure. He was very passionate revolutionary.
Speaker 3 (23:31):
Right, And I remember, I can't remember where it was
that I read about it, but I was somewhat surprised
to read of the overt, shameless bigotry of a lot
of Brits, and specifically British troops who came to pacify
the colonies. They actually looked at us quote unquote as
a bunch of loud, idiotic roubs.
Speaker 4 (23:53):
Yeah, a lot of the officers especially, and you know,
with some there is some legitimacy to that. I mean,
the Americans work country pumpkins. But on the other hand,
we were the ones doing the working and the fighting
and having to pay the taxes. And then have a
bunch of aristocrats who were sent over here a lot
of time, these, especially the royal governors who were sent
over to govern, A lot of them were just, you know,
(24:15):
some kind of aristocrat who had gone bankrupt and needed
to get away from his creditors and would come over
to America to rule for his own wealth.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
I mean, the governor of Virginia was quite open.
Speaker 4 (24:25):
Governor Dunmore was quite open about the fact that he
had come to America to make a fortune because he
needed money from the old country, you know. So, and
then a lot of time these governors wouldn't even come
to America. Virginia, for example, was governed by for almost
a decade by a governor who never even bothered to
visit Virginia. The British colonial policy was crazy and it
(24:47):
was very oppressive. You know, there was no freedom of speech.
You could be executed for expressing your political views in
a newspaper. Your property basically existed at the wheel of parliament.
If Parliament decided to take your stuff way, they claimed
literally absolute power. And in fact, that's the most important
thing that led to the revolution. Parliament passed a law
(25:07):
in seventeen sixty six called the Declaratory Act that said
that Parliament had the authority to legislate for the colonies
quote in all cases whatsoever end quote Wow, And that
ends up yeah, right, that line ends up in the
Declaration of Independence, because that's really the source of all
the other problems. Right, if they can legislate for us
in all cases whatsoever, then your property rights and your
(25:30):
free speech rights and your freedom of religion counting, and
you really are a save.
Speaker 3 (25:34):
If that's the case, what do you think is most
underappreciated about the Declaration of Independence.
Speaker 4 (25:41):
Oh, that's a great question. I think it's probably people
don't know what the grievances referred to they read. If
you read the declaration, it says, you know, it has
those beautiful opening paragraphs about Amini created equal to these things,
and then it lists the things that Britain has done,
and they're written in kind of general terms, like the
first one, you know, the king has he has refused
(26:02):
his assent to laws the most wholesome and necessary for
the public good.
Speaker 2 (26:06):
And people don't know.
Speaker 4 (26:07):
What they're talking about that day is and what it
is is actually Britain claim the King's deputy claimed the
authority to veto any colonial legislation. And they did this
a lot. I mean, for example, it was illegal to
get a divorce in the colonies. The colonies weren't allowed
to pass laws for divorce. You had to get the
king's own permission to get a divorce in colonial America.
(26:28):
But of course the most important one is laws banning
the slave trade.
Speaker 2 (26:31):
The King said no to any of those.
Speaker 4 (26:33):
People don't know this history, and it's starting to fade,
and that leads to this general impression of well, the
British rule over America wasn't really so bad? Well, were
the patriots were just a bunch of whiners? And this
which really ticks me.
Speaker 3 (26:45):
Off right and also in the particulars I think, and
this gets back to the theme that we began with
that it's Tim's fervent belief that the Declaration of Independence
is indeed law in an important United States law founding
document in the truest sense as you get into the
particulars and work through them, and maybe Jefferson should have
(27:07):
had footnotes, but it further illustrates what sort of country
we did not want to be and what we wanted
to be in a fair amount of detail. Because it's
easy enough and sometimes funny to portray it as the
king's jerk and we don't want to be under him anymore.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
We're going to start a new country.
Speaker 3 (27:26):
But the thought of what sort of country was thought
out very very carefully.
Speaker 4 (27:32):
Oh yeah, there's a lot of political philosophy that's distilled
into the Declaration of Independence. And I mentioned that there
was well over a decade of political arguments that had
gone on before independence. There had been a First Continental Congress,
and they had also issued a declaration, and if you
read their declaration, they actually list by number the particular
(27:52):
parliamentary laws that they're objecting to, so they get into
a great deal of details. And there were pamphlets and
speeches that talked about to go philosophy, and Jefferson's distilling
this all down into a single page because he wants
it to be easy to read and understand. But we're
talking about ideas that go back to ancient Greece and
ancient Rome in the declaration, so to really get a
(28:13):
grasp of that, it requires a good deal of depth,
which you know, of course, our educational institutions don't give
students nowadays because we're all supposed to believe that the
Founders are just these evil white guys who wanted to
wanted independence because they wanted to perpetuate slavery, which is
a complete lie.
Speaker 3 (28:28):
Of course, right forgive me if this is inaccurate, but
I think Jack mentioned that one of his sons knew
all about Sesar Chefz, who was an admirable fellow in
a lot of ways, but knew nothing about Thomas Jefferson,
which is, yeah, the.
Speaker 2 (28:39):
Only thing people know about Jefferson is Sally Hemmings Noday.
Speaker 1 (28:42):
Yeah, what's your favorite Jefferson biography?
Speaker 4 (28:45):
By the way, Alf Mapp m App he wrote two volumes.
The first one is called Thomas Jefferson A Strange Case
of Mistaken Identity, and the second volume is called Thomas
Jefferson Passionate Pilgrim. And that's my favorite biography if you
only want to one volume biography. I really like the
John Meachim biography that came out a few years ago.
Speaker 2 (29:05):
The only thing wrong with it is the title.
Speaker 4 (29:06):
It's called The Pursuit of Power, which is a crazy
title because Jefferson did not pursue power, and the book
makes clear that Jefferson did not pursue power. I don't
know why they called it that. Incidentally, talking about books,
I want to mention you. You know you mentioned about
the Declaration setting forth the ideas of the New Country.
So clearly there was a great book that came out
what thirty years ago now called The Radicalism of the
(29:29):
American Revolution by a historian named Gordon Wood. And it
is a hugely important book, very famous in history circles
because it shows just how rapidly and extensively the idea
of equality transformed American culture that within a single lifetime,
people went from a sleepy colonial society where you know,
(29:50):
you had to take your hat off to somebody who
was higher than you on the socials ladder to a
bustling industrial country with railroads and democracy and all these
sort of thing. And it's a very It really tells
the story beautifully, and I would really strongly recommend it
because a lot of people think, oh, well it was
you know, it was a very conservative revolution.
Speaker 2 (30:09):
It wasn't. It was a radical revolution in many ways.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
Great.
Speaker 3 (30:13):
I hear the audience shouting, wait, wait, I'm trying to
write this down. So Tim, if you could text that
to me, your executive producer Hanson, we will post it
at Armstrong and getdy dot com so you can find
it easily. One more segment with Tim Sandafer the Goldwater
Institute coming up.
Speaker 1 (30:26):
Stay with us.
Speaker 3 (30:31):
The final segment with Tim Sandifer of the Goldwater Institute.
It's our Independence Day show a little bit early and Tim,
one of the main reasons I wanted to do this
is I've come to believe that the idea of liberty
has become like the furniture the background of our national discussions.
We've got the people and the food, and there's a
(30:51):
TV going in the corner, and sometimes somebody mentions liberty.
Speaker 1 (30:54):
But we don't teach it.
Speaker 3 (30:56):
We don't teach enthusiasm for it, reverence for it. I
think maybe it's my generation that's at fault. We just
assumed that everybody would always love liberty and want to
defend it, and I've become convinced that's not the case.
And so I've become a bit of a zelot for
trying to do that. So thanks for helping. We're talking
about you.
Speaker 2 (31:13):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (31:15):
Oh yeah, goodness. I try to stop me. But we've
been talking about the Declaration of Independence. Excited to hear
that Tim has a book on that topic coming out
before too terribly long. My daughter went to undergrad at
George Mason University, and I knew the name, and I thought, oh,
George Mason, and I'd started doing some reading and realized
that he, in my mind, is one of your great
(31:35):
underrated founding fathers. Who are your favorite underrated founding fathers?
Speaker 4 (31:41):
Well, I would agree with you about not enough people
knowing about George Mason. He was the author of the
very first Declaration of Rights or the very first Bill
of Rights in America, the Virginia of Rights, and he
was the mentor of George Washington and an elder statesman
that Jefferson and all the others looked up to a
really great years ago, I was at a conference in Washington, DC.
Speaker 2 (32:03):
This is when I was in college.
Speaker 4 (32:04):
As a conference, it was a week long conference, but
we had one day off to go explore a town.
And so I came down that morning and I'm sitting
at the breakfast table and a bunch of these other
college students sitting around, and Uh, I was planning on
going to George Mason's house, which is just a little
south of Washington, d C. And I hear them talking
about what they're going to do, and I'm just sitting
(32:26):
there quietly. I hear one of them say, where are
you gonna Where are you gonna go? And the other
one said, I'm going to Uh, I'm going to go
to Jamestown. And I thought, wow, that's that's kind of far.
And then the first one says, well, what's that and
the other one says, that's where the Pilgrims landed. So
I had to I said I'm sorry. I said, I'm sorry,
But the pilgrims landed in Massachusetts. You're thinking of Jamestown
(32:48):
is is is quite a distance from here, and I
don't think you could really get there in time. And
they go, wow, you really know this stuff. Where are
you going to go? And I said, well, I'm going
to Gunston Hall blank blank stairs. I said that that
was George Mason's house, blank stairs. And one of them,
one of them turns to the other says, I'm really embarrassed.
I don't know who George Mason was. I go to
George Mason University. So I made them go with me.
(33:13):
I ordered them to come with me, and we all
three went down to see Gunston Hall.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
Oh that's great, all right? Who else?
Speaker 4 (33:21):
My other favorite totally unknown founding Father's got named Heim
Solomon H.
Speaker 2 (33:26):
J Y M. Solomon.
Speaker 4 (33:27):
He was a Polish Jew who came to America and
became a financier and was a spy for the for
the Patriots. Was captured twice by the British for spying
and managed to escape, and later on became a prominent
banker and lender who helped to finance the Revolution, in
part by by directly paying people like James Madison when
(33:50):
they weren't getting their paychecks from from home, you know,
mail was slow, so he would just give them money
to pay their rent. He died bankrupt because he gave
away all of his money to the American cause. There's
a statue of him in Chicago, and he you know,
and he was very much of the view that America,
because of religious freedom, was the promised land for Jews.
(34:11):
And I'm getting moved even talking about.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
It because he was. He was a great hero we
all should remember.
Speaker 3 (34:17):
Yeah, wow, that is fantastic in moving. This stuff is
not over studied. It's understudied and underappreciated, especially now. Tim,
Thanks so much for the time, and back to work
on that dang book. Years. I know you have so
little ready to do what for advocating for liberty with
the Goldwater Institute. Tim, great to talk to you. Best
(34:40):
to the missus and we will talk again soon.
Speaker 2 (34:43):
Thank you, see you later.
Speaker 1 (34:44):
All right. Yep.
Speaker 3 (34:45):
Jack is going to join us in the next hour
from Florida. I think I think they're already there on vacation,
but he is. He already has stories to tell, probably
alligator related. I'm looking forward to that. If you happen
to not get our four of the show, or you
got to go do something.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
That's fine. Just subscribe to our podcast, Armstrong and Getty.
Speaker 3 (35:05):
On demand and the radio show is available to you
whenever you want it. We'll also hit some of the
news of the day because there's a good bit of it.
Speaker 1 (35:14):
And goodness knows, whatever comes. Oh, Clips of the Week.
Speaker 3 (35:17):
We have a super bonus Clips of the Week for
you to kick off next hour. Stay tuned if you can.
Tom McClintock, Congressman, will join us as well. Armstrong and
Getty
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